I’m still not able to use my left arm for very much following breaking my wrist several weeks back, so today’s post is deliberately ‘typing light’. It’s a beginner’s level introduction to using Artificial Intelligence for genealogy.

I have to admit to having mixed feelings about Artificial Intelligence. I’m unhappy about its use in faking information, and about products of AI being passed off as someone’s work, for example using it to create an image, a video or a text without making clear that’s how the piece was created. In photography, for example, this seems to be devaluing genuine talent, when accusations of ‘fake!’ are called for an image that a fellow photographer can clearly see has been achieved through skill, planning and use of top-notch equipment.

That said, as genealogists working online, we already benefit from aspects of AI. Hints, Stories, Thrulines and Theories of Relativity, for example, are all brought to us courtesy of AI. Based on these, what we can say is that AI is useful but it is only a starting point. It must be used with caution. We must analyse and verify the information presented to us, but having done so it can be a great help.

The following FindMyPast video with Blaine Bettinger is a good introduction to how we might use AI more widely in genealogy. In the video, Blaine and Jen Baldwin introduce ways we can use it. They also set down a few guidelines:

• AI is not the same as ‘Google’. It deals with words, not facts
• In research, it’s useful as a starting point – for brainstorming
• It’s like a torch, shining a light to guide us towards relevant information; our job then is to decide what’s relevant, what’s not, and where we need more information
• Since it’s a new area, there remain concerns about its use: bias, ethics, plagiarism and copyright issues

Although that video is a good introduction to the themes, we need more information about practical ways to use it. In the follow-on video the same people discuss useful ‘prompts’. A prompt is what is written to outline the precise output the user is seeking. Prompts can be refined to move closer to the desired outcome. Through these example prompts, Blaine gives us an idea of how we could use AI. Some of them may not appeal to you at all; others might. It’s about each of us finding how AI could work for us – how it might help.

Those two videos are more than a year old, and it’s clear that a year is a long time in AI. However, they are useful starting points.

If this is something you’d like to explore there are two Facebook groups you might like to join:

AI Help for Genealogy (UK) is, obviously, UK based. It’s run by the same people who run DNA help for Genealogy (UK)

Genealogy and Artificial Intelligence (AI) is Blaine Bettinger’s group and is US based.

You will quickly realise that everyone on the groups is still learning. Some are further along the line than others. A lot of the posts seem to be from people reporting on an experiment they’ve carried out to see how well AI can cope with a particular prompt or a particular approach.

There is also a podcast series: The Family History AI Show with Mark Thompson and Steve Little comes highly recommended and is bang up to date with the latest developments.

In my next post I’ll include some small experiments of my own. I’m very much at the starting point here. I’d like to find ways to make AI work for me, but I have some definite red lines, and other areas where I’m not sure how the output would be any better than simply doing it myself. I, for example, would never use AI for writing; and there are some research tasks in which I believe the time spent working on a document help me to get an in-depth understanding of a family. Simply reading a list of statements about its content wouldn’t give me that deep-dive familiarisation.

Have you used AI? Do leave a comment with your experiences.